


(nous vivons) sur le fil du rasoir

by Bronte



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Action/Adventure, Aged-Up Character(s), Angst, Dark, F/M, Gen, Paris (City)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-02
Updated: 2017-09-02
Packaged: 2018-12-23 00:26:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11978262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bronte/pseuds/Bronte
Summary: Marinette and Chat had already noticed that Le Papillon's targets had been changing, his focus turning to those whose lives were already anarchic. The refugee camps, the low-income neighbourhoods, the people who’d lost everything living on the streets. The press was having a field day demonising the newcomers and both Chat and Marinette could only watch as Paris flayed itself, a city on the edge of a knife.





	(nous vivons) sur le fil du rasoir

But still, like dust, I rise.

             1. _Clichy-sous-Bois_

  
Marinette really loves this part. It’s always more fun when there’s someone at her six, watching her flank and game for an exchange. Chat is particularly adept at the witty banter she can’t help but indulge in during their missions, and she thrives on it.  
  
She runs towards the fragmented foundation of an abandoned building and absorbs the impact with the balls of her feet only to clutch the top of the wall with her hands and launch herself over it. She lands at ninety degrees and tucks her chin to her chest upon impact, pushing her shoulder forward. She dodges a rain of fireballs as she rolls forwards, using the continuing momentum of her body to come up on both feet and duck behind a decrepit HVAC on the other side. She snatches her yo-yo from the holster wrapped around her waist and flings it at the akumatised victim taking shots a block down, catching him right between the eyes.  
  
She keeps moving, her eyes peeled for suspicious movement as she scales the buildings of _Clichy-sous-Bois_. The sun beats down on her and the effect of the heat is palpable; the red and black suit wrapped around her body does little to shield her from the barely tolerable humidity. It doesn’t do much when it comes to blending in either.  
  
Covering the rooftops with Chat, even when separated, is practically pointless if one’s ambition is concealment. The boy sticks out like a proverbial sore thumb, all cat puns and charm accompanied by a barely tolerable sense of decency. It would make Marinette ill if it didn’t also make her feel strangely fond of the fiercely loyal Miraculous bearer.  
  
Marinette reminisces fondly as she kicks one leg up to clear the height of the wall, using both her hands as momentum to fire herself over the brick barricade. The trail for _Le Papillon_ may have come up cold in _Popincourt_ , but that hadn’t stopped him from being indomitable in spirit, flinging jokes and witticisms at her until she’d stopped sulking. Needless to say, the fight for Paris would have been a lot tougher without him at her side.  
  
Speak of the devil, Marinette thinks as the cat Miraculous shoots up from nowhere, covering Marinette just as a burst of enemy fire tears up the crumbling roof she’s scrambling across. She leaps off the building with no hope of making it to the adjacent roof and Chat easily catches her, tossing her to the other side. The two of them work seamlessly, taking down akuma after akuma of rogue citizens tempted by ultimate power. They’ve travelled the length and width of Paris and its banlieues six times over already, methodically ripping apart _Le Papillon’s_ campaigns at the seams. They’re both getting a little more ruthless when it comes down to it, their somewhat pacifist philosophy be damned. The rest of Paris is getting antsy and Chat and Marinette know what’s at stake in the wake of a corrupt Miraculous with seemingly little to nothing left to lose.  
  
Chat takes out the last of the fire snipers with his _Cataclysme_ and Marinette uses that moment of distraction to break through a weak point in the ceiling and rain down on the decaying apartment building, striking an akumatised assailant with her instep on the way. Rotating her body, Marinette dodges Chat and invites him join the fray, directing both her feet at her next target’s head with striking precision. Catching his attention, Chat lends her the edge of his baton as he catches it, and she utilities the boost kicking back and upwards, taking two akumatised citizens down with two synonymous high kicks to the trachea.  
  
It’s Chat who takes captive the only possessed person left in the room just as Marinette finishes clearing the rest the run-down apartment. It’s a scene they’ve often seen before as Chat pushes the agent against the wall face first, holding him by the scruff of the neck. His interrogation skills had certainly improved since they first started encountering this kind of akuma, the ruthless, killing type that stretched far from the ones they used to fight as kids; he’d been somewhat of a softie then. Times were changing though, and even the most golden of hearts have been growing a hard exterior.  
  
They’re not surprised to find out that _Le Papillon_ has been putting sleeper akuma all around the area and with the influx of migrants and refugees in and around the city, he’d found no shortage of desperation and grief to prey upon. Marinette and Chat had already noticed that his targets had been changing, his focus turning to those whose lives were already anarchic. The refugee camps, the low-income neighbourhoods, the people who’d lost everything now living on the streets. The press was having a field day demonising the newcomers and both Chat and Marinette could only watch as Paris flayed itself, a city on the edge of a knife.  
  
Marinette is beginning to get impatient when Chat twists the akuma’s neck just right, and he starts squealing profanities, begging him to stop. Marinette is momentarily impressed, that is until _Le Papillon_ starts speaking through him, spewing things she’d rather not be hearing. He taunts them from the mouth of another, grinning like the coward he is, hiding behind a mask. Marinette shudders and Chat only presses harder, answering _Le Papillon’s_ taunts with his own, goading him for any piece of information he can reach.  
  
_Le Papillon_ starts talking in circles and Chat lets the akuma’s body drops to the floor. He turns and doesn’t even make eye contact with Marinette as she moves in to finish the job, a ritual they’ve come to accept as part of their mission. She finishes the job swiftly and smoothly; there’s no reason to make the capture and release of the butterfly longer than necessary. After all, she’s going to have to save her energy for the hunt ahead.  
  
She catches up with Chat on the second-floor stairwell, fiddling over a piece of technology. She smiles grimly and plucks it out of his hand, easily tapping in the correct coordinates and pointing Alya’s intricately hacked satellite in their direction. Alya, as interfering as she could be, was particularly fond of making herself useful, and the tech she had calibrated was proving to be their only saving grace as they crossed through banlieue after banlieue looking for a magical signature that, when taking into account an estimation of its mass, could only be tracked by a very specific, but ultimately short-wave frequency. It’s incredibly inaccurate in terms of finding an exact location, but the device in her palm tells her that the purified butterfly is still somewhere in the city.  
  
“Location?”  
  
“It’s heading towards Paris proper,” she replies, fiddling with the receptors, “South West heading.”  
  
“Will you be able to tell if it heads to the 4e again?” Chat asks, strapping his baton against his back.  
  
“It’s nowhere near yet,” she says, tipping her head to the side and squinting at the transparent screen, “I can’t make any promises, but I’d wager tomorrow’s breakfast that it’s heading there.”  
  
“This is too easy...” Chat mutters, heaving a sigh, “Are you sure?”  
  
Marinette hands him the tracker and they both peer down at the device. He glances back up at her, their faces turning up simultaneously with matching expressions of uncertainty. She’s seen that look a handful of times before and pockets the tech, “Come on, I know a great bakery along the way.”

**Author's Note:**

> Arriving in a new fandom two years late with Starbucks.


End file.
